I'm guessing it was from 1880 to 1890 when railroads switched from wood to coal. Was wood the dominant fuel initially or was coal used right from the start with wood only where it was easily accessible?

I stand corrected, I went back into my library and did a little research. Coal replaced wood for the most part starting in 1870 and lasted until 1900 - 1910. SP experimented with oil starting about 1900 and made full conversion to it around 1910, except on the Rio Grand division. Hope that helps."

I tried to sell my two cents worth, but no one would give me a plug nickel for it.

Switch from wood to coal was earlier. Remember that the East Coast was covered with forest that had to be cleared, so there was plenty of wood; meanwhile the technical methods of 'consume-its-own-smoke' coke or anthracite combustion were long in coming with many false starts. Only with the development of a bituminous coal industry was there cost-effective fuel in necessary quantity; I suspect the value of railroads in transporting coal was related in a number of ways to coal's increasing adoption as locomotive fuel.

Note also the repeated attempts to burn slack, culm, and other low-grade or by-products of coal, and "improve thermodynamics" to allow money-saving on fuel cost.

I'm guessing it was from 1880 to 1890 when railroads switched from wood to coal. Was wood the dominant fuel initially or was coal used right from the start with wood only where it was easily accessible?

They used wood burners on the Houston and Texas Central from construction in 1850's to (guessing) around 1890-1900. The line ran from Galveston & Houston up to the Red River (border with OK) in Dennison. H&TC I think came under SP control in 1883 but they did not officially roll it into T&NO until 1927 I think.

I can't give exact dates, but I believe the B&O was using coal well before the Civil War, and I'm sure other Eastern roads did the same. As in just about everything else, railroads were and are in a money making game. The cost must be reasonable in relation to the benefits achieved. If coal is locally available at a reasonable cost, as it was on many Eastern roads, then the decision to convert was a no-brainer.

Wood was scarce out on the Great Plains, and what existed was often poor quality Cottonwood. A lot of wood was needed for ties and bridges, so it was wasteful to put too much of that limited resource into the firebox. Union Pacific operated many coal burners in the early years, especially after reaching Wyoming where mines were developed.

Tom's post hit the proverbial nail on the head. The B&O converted to coal when they first encountered it at Cumberland MD about 1844. The PRR did also as soon as they had access to coal. It was all a matter of cost and availability. Coal provides lots more heat per pound, which means more boiler HP for any given firebox size, and is not the spark spreader that wood fired engines were.

And yet, looking at the far side of a rather wide ocean, there were wood burners operating in the Cenbtral Japan Alps until the late 1950s - on the 2'6" gauge Kiso Forest Railway. Their replacements were four wheel diesel 'critters.'

Even more recently, there was at least one sugar cane railway in the Philippines that was still running bagasse-burning steam (including a 2-6-6-2 used as the main plant steam generator) in 1976. Bagasse is what's left after sugar cane is crushed and squeezed dry, roughly equivalent to straw.

I went into the archives here at the Fortress Firelock knowing I'd read of Mr. Frimbo's eucalyptus trip, and lo and behold, found it. It was in Africa in then-Portugese Angola, on the Benguela Railway, and the locomotive was a Garratt. And according to Mr. Frimbo, that eucalyptus burned HOT! The shower of sparks was incredible!

I should add concerning the railroad's switch from wood to coal that it happened at exactly the right time. By the mid-19th Century the Eastern Seaboard of the US was, well not completely deforested but darn near close to it, all that timber going for fuel, construction, export to a lumber-starved Europe (there were ships at the time called "timber droughers" that were built for one-way timber shipments, the cargo AND the ship being sold at the end of the voyage), and for land-clearing for agricultural purposes. Firewood for locomotives was getting hard to come by and getting expensive. Bituminous coal showed up just when it was needed.

Interestingly, anthracite coal had been tried earlier, but it only worked well in vertical boilered locomotives which became obsolete fairly quickly. Anthracite's turn would come later.

A personal observation: Touring the Civil War battlefields here in the Richmond VA area and seeing the surviving trenches and fieldworks snaking through the woods I thought to myself "Man! It must have been rough building those fieldworks with all these trees in the way, and with hand tools no less!" And then it dawned on me, when those fieldworks were built those trees weren't there! The woods are all second and third growth trees, the area had been completely deforested by the 1860's.

A personal observation: Touring the Civil War battlefields here in the Richmond VA area and seeing the surviving trenches and fieldworks snaking through the woods I thought to myself "Man! It must have been rough building those fieldworks with all these trees in the way, and with hand tools no less!" And then it dawned on me, when those fieldworks were built those trees weren't there! The woods are all second and third growth trees, the area had been completely deforested by the 1860's.

Irrespective of the trees - digging those fortifications by hand, marching a couple of hundred miles to Gettysburg (or wherever else) in all kinds of weahter, fighting, dieing or worse getting wounded getting operated on by the Doctors of the day without the concept of gems being known or understood. Today's men????

Amazing how a society can be turned to hate - both North & South - in the name of prejudice. Each side doing their best to inflame their own to hate beyond hate the other.

The real key to successful coal use was the development of the firebrick arch. Early coal burners like most of B&O's designs, and Winan's Camels, tried to use the same basic firebox used in wood burners. The firebrick arch improved the air and fire flow inside the firebox, allowing full combustion of bituminous coal. Coal burning also required the use of better iron (later steel) and especially iron or steel firetubes, since fly ash from coal gave copper firetubes a very short life.

Irrespective of the trees - digging those fortifications by hand, marching a couple of hundred miles to Gettysburg (or wherever else) in all kinds of weahter, fighting, dieing or worse getting wounded getting operated on by the Doctors of the day without the concept of gems being known or understood. Today's men????

Amazing how a society can be turned to hate - both North & South - in the name of prejudice. Each side doing their best to inflame their own to hate beyond hate the other.

What is "Today's men" supposed to mean? More recent wars, at least from the U.S. standpoint, have involved privation and sacrifice by an ever smaller portion of our young men (and today, young women). The medical care keeps getting better by some standards. But the privation and pain endured by our modern soldiers, yes, they don't have to endure anesthetic-free limb amputations, but I am told there are some mighty painful front-line procedures for wound treatment that I won't get into here.

That many fewer of our people need to fight has to do in part with the kind of expensive-in-money expeditionary wars that are the source of many complaints here about how the money could be better spent on high-speed passenger trains. The theory behind that is that it is better to fight "over there" rather than giving each able bodied male a rifle and marching them against defended positions "over here", Civil War style. Are you saying "men aren't what they once were" as when we fought the Civil War?

And are you drawing a moral equivalency between North and South? I was accused of drawing a moral equivalency with Imperial Japan when I was constructing a response to someone here who had a rather simplistic understanding of the potential conflicts facing the United States today. And based on what I had suggested regarding the Pacific War with Japan, yes, maybe the North could have allowed the South to secede and keep slavery until they got dragged into the modern world by England, a trading partner that had come to oppose it with military action. Maybe the war aims of the North weren't as holy and righteous as depicted by the Abolitionist cause?

But saying that the North was driven by hate? President Lincoln was driven by hate in his quest to hold the country together that he was elected to serve? That the soldiers who died at Gettysburg were in service of the cause that "government of the people, for the people, and by the people should not perish" was Union propaganda?

If GM "killed the electric car", what am I doing standing next to an EV-1, a half a block from the WSOR tracks?

I think Balt may have been speaking rhetorically when he used the phrase "todays men." There's certainly not a damn thing wrong with those kids out there on the firing line now that are dressed up like soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines.

And the "dressed up like..." phrase I just used? Ask any veteran, they'll understand.

And the hate during the Civil War? It certainly was there after the draftees showed up, post-Gettysburg. That's when the war really got nasty. All those conscripted men who had to leave familys, homes, farms, businesses, North and South, had quite a bit of rage to take out on someone.

"Nuff said. We can't understand the Civil War the way those who lived through it understood it, if even they did.

Irrespective of the trees - digging those fortifications by hand, marching a couple of hundred miles to Gettysburg (or wherever else) in all kinds of weahter, fighting, dieing or worse getting wounded getting operated on by the Doctors of the day without the concept of gems being known or understood. Today's men????

Well modern medicine has improved but to answer your question, yes, most of that is still done today. Expectation today is 25 miles a day on foot but they will push it to 35 miles or more in a real emergency. I had to dig fighting positions to armpit level (with deeper grenade sumps) more than once but typically that is not done more than once a year but included with a road march, very exhausting. However the nice thing as back then as is now, they let you take cat naps and sleep when you can reasonably.......you still get some sleep and recuperation.

On average 12-18 mile road march once a quarter untimed. 12 miler once a year timed and you better finish in 3 hours or less.

"Nuff said. We can't understand the Civil War the way those who lived through it understood it, if even they did.

Agree, Civil War uniforms sucked and didn't hold up as todays uniforms do same with the boots.........though one could make an argument with the boot issue for Afghanistan and subsequent boot issues, Pentagon working on that still. I was not a Veteran of that war but I heard stories on the terrain takes it's toll on the boots and you go through three pairs in a year's deployment to Afghanistan......that combined with the constant up and down of the Mountains would be enough to seriously turn me into a grumpy person.

The most recent DoD issue of boots for Afghanistan have a special rubber moulding between the sole and the boot to hold them together better from what I observed Soldiers wearing in the airports......it's the third attempt to get the boot construction right for Afghanistan's terrain.

BaltACD is right about the medicine and medevac. Far superior today then it has ever been in any past war. All Army Soldiers are trained to administer IV's to help stabilize the wounded now as well as recite 9 line Medevac procedure over the radio (change from the 1980's when only Medics were trained in that). Most are trained in setup of a LZ for Medevac Choppers.

I was accused of drawing a moral equivalency with Imperial Japan when I was constructing a response to someone here who had a rather simplistic understanding of the potential conflicts facing the United States today.

From the guy that posted that SDI doesn't work......and your concerned people take him seriously on National Security issues????? Anyway that whole thread should not even brought up Japan or Hitler it was about Gander, Newfoundland.

And are you drawing a moral equivalency between North and South? I was accused of drawing a moral equivalency with Imperial Japan when I was constructing a response to someone here who had a rather simplistic understanding of the potential conflicts facing the United States today. And based on what I had suggested regarding the Pacific War with Japan, yes, maybe the North could have allowed the South to secede and keep slavery until they got dragged into the modern world by England, a trading partner that had come to oppose it with military action. Maybe the war aims of the North weren't as holy and righteous as depicted by the Abolitionist cause?

I seriously doubt if you have any understanding of the moral issues involved, much less the geopolitical ones. Your inability to understand others' writings that differ with your views and communicate clearly without distortions and tangential rambing is seen not only when you post here but apparently in your classes, judging by student reviews.

I seriously doubt if you have any understanding of the moral issues involved, much less the geopolitical ones. Your inability to understand others' writings that differ with your views and communicate clearly without distortions and tangential rambing is seen not only when you post here but apparently in your classes, judging by student reviews.

As to the student reviews, I guess a person growing up in Cook County unavoidably acquires a certain edge to their personality that can rub the more calm and gentle people "north of the border" the wrong way. Maybe that was a factor in the November election?

A tangential "rambing" I used to do in lecture was drawing an analogy between current in an electrical inductor and the implacable inertia of a train, which I incorporate into an Operation Lifesaver inspired message regarding the dangers associated with disregarding crossing signals for the Wisconsin and Southern line that cuts through the middle of Campus. I offer a way to remember the formula time_constant = inductance L over resistance R as "heavy train -- large L, weak brakes -- small R, long time to stop the train."

I guess offering what students regard as scoldings regarding cutting across grade crossings is not popular. Whereas people in Illinois accept the admonishment as well as law enforcement on this topic, I guess there is an increased spirit of individualism and self-expression here is Wisconsin, you know, the kind of thing that escalated to confrontations between certain ranchers and law enforcement authorities out West.

Heck, I have tried my hardest to get the Dean's Office involved in getting Operation Lifesaver out here during new student orientation in the Engineering College -- the Wisconsin and Southern line cuts right past buildings in the College, where I was referred to Facility Parking and Maintenance as having the bailiwick, where my messages on the topic got swallowed up in University bureaucracy.

What don't I understand about moral and geopolitical issues in world affairs? What I expressed as my interpretation of the view in Imperial Japan for justifying invading China -- that China was a "failed state" ruled by warlords -- is one that I received from Claire Chennault's memoir "Way of a Fighter" about his life as an American mercenary aiding Chiang Kai-Shek. Chennault was a fierce supporter of Chiang and perhaps a contributor to public opinion in the U.S. that Japan was doing serious wrong in China. I also read Daniel Ford's "Flying Tigers" to get balance on this issue lest you accuse me of only reading a "rabid anti-Communist."

Chennault also talks about Mao's Communists. Whereas Chennault was a fierce anti-Communist, and his widow got herself mixed up in some Nixon "dirty tricks" regarding Johnson trying for a peaceful settlement of the Viet Nam war, people of his level of understanding of internationale affairs are able to present their understanding of the thinking behind the people they oppose. He writes about how the Communists help protect his downed "Flying Tigers" American flyers even if the Tigers were Chiangs "show" because of their common enemy in Japan, but he also explains that they regarded Chiang as one among other non-Communists warlords.

What am I saying here that is wrong, and if I say something wrong, offer your explanation instead of ad-hominem attacks, please?

If GM "killed the electric car", what am I doing standing next to an EV-1, a half a block from the WSOR tracks?

I suggest you look at the studies on the effectiveness of the SDI. The trials were not a very realistic measure of its effectiveness in an actual attack.

As I was saying, talk to students in a Wisconsin classroom that way, and let's see what your student reviews look like. I need to not talk that way too.

A lot of people here and elsewhere take "I suggest you look at the studies" as sarcasm and criticism that a person hasn't already seen those studies and come to your conclusions on them.

You could say, "I base my opinion on studies of the effectiveness of SDI. The way I see it, the measures of effectiveness you cite were based on trials that many regard as no realistic." The other way is regarded as much less condescending. It leaves open that the other person reasonably arrived at their opinions and doesn't as much as call them stupid.

But if you don't leave open the possibility that anyone can have an opinion differing from yours without either stupidity or malice or obtuseness, I guess some disagreements cannot be bridged. So keep doing what you always do, then.

If GM "killed the electric car", what am I doing standing next to an EV-1, a half a block from the WSOR tracks?

I think Balt may have been speaking rhetorically when he used the phrase "todays men." There's certainly not a damn thing wrong with those kids out there on the firing line now that are dressed up like soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines.

I had to smile when I read that. Up in Alaska, at a missle site on top of a mountain, in the middle of the usual daily horseplay, one of my fellow "inmates" commented that this place was really just a boys' school. A lot of truth in that.

What don't I understand about moral and geopolitical issues in world affairs? What I expressed as my interpretation of the view in Imperial Japan for justifying invading China -- that China was a "failed state" ruled by warlords -- is one that I received from Claire Chennault's memoir "Way of a Fighter" about his life as an American mercenary aiding Chiang Kai-Shek.

Rather a different statement from your original one, which others besides myself condemned. Simply reiterating Japan's slimy justification for aggression, genocide, rape, child murders, etc. at bayonet point in China and elswhere in East Asia is deplorable. Heck, they blamed their attack on Pearl Harbor as justified by our embargo on selling them our scrap. I quote from your post:

"President Roosevelt's ban of shipments of scrap iron and petroleum to the Empire in Japan. Whereas the presidential authority to enact such a ban was authorized by Congress, and at the time a judicial stay preventing it would have been regarded as a court overstepping its authority under the constitution, it was plainly motivated by anti-Japanese racism in the United States, along with a misunderstanding in public sentiment in the U.S. of the Japanese Emperor wanting to bring order to a China that had fragmented into fiefdoms of warlords."

The Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere was the Japanese euphemism for invading other Asian nations (China, Thailand) and colonies (Philippines, Indochina, Burma, Malay, Dutch East Indies). An Investigation of Global Policy with the Yamato Race as Nucleus—a secret document completed in 1943 for high-ranking government use—laid out the superior position of Japan in the Greater Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, showing the subordination of other nations was part of explicit policy and not forced by the war.It explicitly states the superiority of the Japanese over other Asian races and provides evidence that the Sphere was inherently hierarchical, including the Japanese Empire's true intention of domination over the Asian continent and Pacific Ocean.

Rather a different statement from your original one, which others besides myself condemned. Simply reiterating Japan's slimy justification for aggression, genocide, rape, child murders, etc. at bayonet point in China and elswhere in East Asia is deplorable. Heck, they blamed their attack on Pearl Harbor as justified by our embargo on selling them our scrap. I quote from your post:

"President Roosevelt's ban of shipments of scrap iron and petroleum to the Empire in Japan. Whereas the presidential authority to enact such a ban was authorized by Congress, and at the time a judicial stay preventing it would have been regarded as a court overstepping its authority under the constitution, it was plainly motivated by anti-Japanese racism in the United States, along with a misunderstanding in public sentiment in the U.S. of the Japanese Emperor wanting to bring order to a China that had fragmented into fiefdoms of warlords."

Good, I am glad we got this matter resolved.

Now tell me about the view you expressed regarding a U.S. president's temporary travel ban targeting now 7 countries that are active conflict zones, among which it is arguable that atrocities comparable to those of Imperial Japan are being committed. A view that this ban has nothing to do with legitimate national security interests of the United States. A view that this action is cynical political pandering to deplorable sentiments among some in the United States, a xenophobia based on overblown fears regarding the abilities and desires of some of the refugees seeking to come to the U.S. to shoot dead county goverment workers at office holiday parties.

In what you are quoting here, I am expressing an opinion that a hypothetical court ruling blocking President Roosevelt in embargoing Japan could have said, that the embargo was unconstitutional because " it was plainly motivated by anti-Japanese racism in the United States, along with a misunderstanding in public sentiment in the U.S. of the Japanese Emperor wanting to bring order to a China that had fragmented into fiefdoms of warlords."

What I said are indeed my words, but it expresses sentiments that were not unknown in the U.S., either then or now. For example, now we regard the WW-II internment of Japanese persons or citizens of Japanese ethnicity as being a black mark on our country that was motivated by elements of overblown fears and of racism. But, if you regard the Showa Emperor as the object of veneration of the personality cult that resulted in the horrors in China, it was regarded at least at the time that Japanese persons along with persons of Japanese descent, living in the U.S., owed the Emperor this type of quasi-religious allegiance. You see where I am going with this, or is this one of my "tangents and asides" that makes no logical sense?

Please compare and contrast what I said a judge hypothetically could have ruled in 1941 with what judges in the U.S. did indeed rule, which you praised, that a presidential executive order was unconstitutional because it did a similar thing in 2017.

Thanks!

If GM "killed the electric car", what am I doing standing next to an EV-1, a half a block from the WSOR tracks?

I suggest you look at the studies on the effectiveness of the SDI. The trials were not a very realistic measure of its effectiveness in an actual attack.

That was decades ago and that was the very initial attempts.

The money spent on research and testing of SDI played a significant role in producing our three tiered ABM system of today which most countries want to aquire and China and Russia are attempting to counter. So I would not say SDI was anymore a failure than Skylab was a failure for the follow-on International Space Station.

Most of the world is using parts if not all of our ABM technology today including Israel for it's Iron Dome defense. Money well spent at keeping the peace, if you ask me.

'CM, your comment on Civil War uniforms reminded me of something I read on a military history forum...

Question: How could ANYBODY fight in a wool uniform?

Answer: By pulling the trigger.

Hey, you do the best with what you've got.

There's a great story from the end of the Civil War. A confederate POW was speaking with a Union cavalryman and said...

"Gee, your uniform looks so nice, your boots look so comfortable, your horse looks so healthy, and you look like your bowels is SO regular!"

Ha-ha, The Army's dark OG OPFOR uniforms used to be wool back in the 1980's. They wanted everyone to feel like a Russian in 90-100 degree heat of the mid and deep South. Why we had to have that level of authenticity, I'll never know.

BTW, as long as we are off topic, after Veterans Day this year, they are going to open the PX to all Honorably Discharged Army Veterans. I would presume the Navy is following suit with the BX.....you might want to check. You can only use their online system though can't go shopping in a physical BX but still.....great new benefit and great way to get foriegn gifts on the cheap, like German Clocks, Stiens, etc.

What I said are indeed my words, but it expresses sentiments that were not unknown in the U.S., either then or now. For example, now we regard the WW-II internment of Japanese persons or citizens of Japanese ethnicity as being a black mark on our country that was motivated by elements of overblown fears and of racism. But, if you regard the Showa Emperor as the object of veneration of the personality cult that resulted in the horrors in China, it was regarded at least at the time that Japanese persons along with persons of Japanese descent, living in the U.S., owed the Emperor this type of quasi-religious allegiance. You see where I am going with this, or is this one of my "tangents and asides" that makes no logical sense? Please compare and contrast what I said a judge hypothetically could have ruled in 1941 with what judges in the U.S. did indeed rule, which you praised, that a presidential executive order was unconstitutional because it did a similar thing in 2017. Thanks!

Maybe I am getting too old, but I cannot understand your point. Obviously forcing the Japanese residents into camps was a racist stain on our history, but it had nothing to do with Roosevelt's embargo. Nor did anti-Japanese racism. It was a direct consequence of Imperial Japan's vicious attacks on and occupation of China, including the documented "Rape of Nanking" (documented by John Rabe in 1937-38). I suppose you were attempting an counterfactual analogy to defend Trump's travel ban. More analogous to Trump's act would be if FDR had embargoed shipments of potentially military materials to other Buddhist countries, while inexplicably leaving Japan off the list.